THE LIBERTARIAN ENTERPRISE
Number 670, May 13, 2012The Bill of Rights isn't about us, it's about them.It isn't a list of things we're permitted to do, it'sa list of things they aren't allowed even to consider.

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I carry two Shire Silver cards in my wallet. One is for a gram
of pure silver, the other is a tenth gram of pure gold.

Ron Helwig has been making and selling his Shire Silver cards
for years. I met him in person at the Porcupine Festival in
New Hampshire last June. He's a very good guy, diligent, clever,
industrious, a good father, and a friend.

Ron makes the cards using jeweller's silver wire, silver tape,
and gold wire. He showed me the process of carefully measuring,
weighing, and cutting the wire, then laminating the wire with a
card describing it in detail. You can see it yourself if you go
to the Porcupine Festival late next month.

Mind you, with Robin Freiheit posing for photos of herself with
her finger on the trigger of an M16 rifle while not looking down
the barrel and otherwise embarrassingly not practising good gun
safety, you may not find the Porcupine Festival an agreeable event
to attend. I gather she's a mainstay of the event's dances; maybe
someone will show her a few basic facts at a gun range some day.

Of course, you have to go deep into Yankee land to get to New
Hampshire. So not on my list for this year.

I am looking forward to reading Neale's and Lee's forthcoming analyses of the Bill of Rights.

One minor quibble: Lee believes that the originally-proposed second Article in amendment to the Constitution (regarding compensation of legislators) might have made a major change in how the legislature of the U.S. was constituted. I find that I have to disagree.

In the unlikely event that anyone is unfamiliar with the fact, allow me to mention that this Article was eventually adopted as the 27th Amendment, with the last required state ratifying in 1992. Congress (or at least certain Congresscritters) were, as you may imagine, not well pleased by this revolting development. Reaction was swift and decisive.

The first thing that Congress did was appeal to the Supreme Court, arguing that the Amendment couldn't possibly be valid since more than seven years had elapsed since the Article was proposed. Surprisingly, the Supremes rightly said, basically, "Yah. So what?"

Of course the next thing the cynical bastards did was vote themselves an automatic pay raise in each ensuing year unless they specifically voted to deny it at that time. I have yet to see Congress vote to deny itself additional largesse from the public trough.

While researching the citation to back a claim re: Thomas Jefferson's
writings I discovered that MEMOIR, CORRESPONDENCE, AND MISCELLANIES,
FROM THE PAPERS OF THOMAS JEFFERSON.

Jefferson, Thomas (2009-10-04). Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies,
From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson, Volume 1,2, & 3 (Kindle Location 2).
Public Domain Books. Kindle Editionthat is three volumes of TJ's
original writings as edited by Edited by Thomas Jefferson Randolph,
his grandson, are available for free from amazon on Kindle. This way
we can see exactly what at least one of the Founding Fathers was
trying to do when this country was started.

Rex May republished an article of mine published in TLE entitled "Attack
of the Dog Men". It is obviously more editorial opinion than hard science
(though as far as I know the science is reliable.) . II credited L. Neil
Smith for his contribution to my train of thought, however I did not
credit Jerry Pournelle for planting the first seed of the idea back in
the Eighties with one of the characters in his Janissary series who
said he was a domestic human, starship pilot working for alien slavers
he was if I remember right. Don't want Falkenberg's Legion coming after
me.

* Define manufacturing so broadly that any gun owner who adds an accessory such as a scope or changes a stock on a firearm would be required to obtain a manufacturing license;

* Require "microstamping" of ammunition.

The treaty could also be self-executing, which would mean that it would achieve its anti-gun objectives whether or not implementing legislation was passed by Congress.

Some people think the U.S. would never sign off on such a treaty. Well, think again.

In 2009, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced the U.S. agreed to negotiate on the treaty.

That's a shift from the Bush administration, which declared the ATT dead on arrival. President Bush wouldn't have delivered the treaty to the Senate for ratification, but Obama can't wait to use this vehicle as a way to show his anti-gun base that he is doing something on the gun control front.

GOA is continually briefing Senators on the dangers of this treaty. We even have a number of Senators who have committed in writing to oppose the treaty.

But one thing we fear is that the ATT is so massive (it would regulate everything from battleships to bullets) that many Senators may feel that the small arms portion is insignificant compared to the entire document.

A number of Senators who purport to be pro-gun could possibly go along with the treaty. It is also likely that no Democrat Senators  even those from so-called red states  will vote against the president in the months leading up to the election.

All this makes the Moran bill vitally important. S. 2205 will not allow the Hillary Clinton and the Obama administration to even attempt to negotiate away our gun rights.

The Moran bill is also a good test of which Senators are willing to stand against the president and oppose the ATT.

Please take a minute to urge your own Senators to cosponsor S. 2205, the Second Amendment Sovereignty Act of 2012.

And then please consider contributing to help GOA continue to battle this treaty and other attacks on the right to keep and bear arms.

It is important to act right away. Negotiations on the ATT are happening NOW! The committee at the UN in charge of the treaty expects to have a final draft ready by this summer. We need to use every means available to stop it in its tracks.

Alan Simpson, Senator from Wyoming , Co-Chair of the Deficit Commission, calls senior citizens the Greediest Generation as he compared "Social Security" to a Milk Cow with 310 million teats.

Here's a response in a letter from PATTY MYERS in Montana ... I think she is a little ticked off! She also tells it like it is!

Hey Alan, let's get a few things straight..

1. As a career politician, you have been on the public dole for FIFTY YEARS.

2. I have been paying Social Security taxes for 48 YEARS (since I was 15 years old. I am now 63).

3 My Social Security payments, and those of millions of other Americans, were safely tucked away in an interest bearing account for decades until you political pukes decided to raid the account and give OUR money to a bunch of zero ambition losers in return for votes, thus bankrupting the system and turning Social Security into a Ponzi scheme that would have made Bernie Madoff proud..

4. Recently, just like Lucy & Charlie Brown, you and your ilk pulled the proverbial football away from millions of American seniors nearing retirement and moved the goalposts for full retirement from age 65 to age 67. NOW, you and your shill commission is proposing to move the goalposts YET AGAIN.

5. I, and millions of other Americans, have been paying into Medicare from Day One, and now you morons propose to change the rules of the game. Why? Because you idiots mismanaged other parts of the economy to such an extent that you need to steal money from Medicare to pay the bills.

6. I, and millions of other Americans, have been paying income taxes our entire lives, and now you propose to increase our taxes yet again. Why? Because you incompetent bastards spent our money so profligately that you just kept on spending even after you ran out of money. Now, you come to the American taxpayers and say you need more to pay off YOUR debt. To add insult to injury, you label us "greedy" for calling "bullshit" on your incompetence. Well, Captain Bullshit, I have a few questions for YOU.

1. How much money have you earned from the American taxpayers during your pathetic 50-year political career?

2. At what age did you retire from your pathetic political career, and how much are you receiving in annual retirement benefits from the American taxpayers?

3. How much do you pay for YOUR government provided health insurance?

4. What cuts in YOUR retirement and healthcare benefits are you proposing in your disgusting deficit reduction proposal, or, as usual, have you exempted yourself and your political cronies?

It is you, Captain Bullshit, and your political co-conspirators called Congress who are the "greedy" ones. It is you and your fellow nutcases who have bankrupted America and stolen the American dream from millions of loyal, patriotic taxpayers. And for what? Votes. That's right, sir. You and yours have bankrupted America for the sole purpose of advancing your pathetic political careers. You know it, we know it, and you know that we know it.

And you can take that to the bank, you miserable son of a bitch.

If you like the way things are in America delete this. If you agree with what a fellow Montana citizen Patty Myers says, PASS IT ON!!!!

I am sure that this is not an original thought as there are so very few of those in this world. But I haven't seen this meme being seeded or dispersed anywhere else and this forum one of my favorites. Thank you Ken and L Neil for TLE.

But enough of that- I am a delegate in a northern socialist state home to places like Frostbite Falls (hint...). I am a Ron Paul supporter, not because he's perfect, but because he has displayed the only consistent integrity and courage in the district of criminals in my lifetime. RP is quietly adding to his delegate count in state after state, mostly since we who supported him learned in 2008 firsthand the chicanery of the Republican establishment, and started to get serious about gaming the system like it has gamed us.

Nonetheless, we all know there is nothing the big boys won't stoop to to maintain their illicit power and everything they've stolen from us.

I am a Republican delegate (I know, but I simply cannot ever work with the guys even more likely to try to get their bully boys to kill me and my kids because they're afraid of my guns). Because of this I cannot ethically be a Libertarian delegate, aside from the fact that the LP-US has all the flaws so well documented here and elsewhere.

However, might it not make a bit of sense for the LP to nominate Ron Paul as their presidential candidate? This would put his name on the ballots of all fifty States for the popular vote, regardless of what the Establishment Republicans pull.

We all face the spectacle of the disgusting east coast marxist Moneymitts up against our current post colonial African Marxist graduate of Patrice Lumbaba University. (OK, I haven't a shred of evidence that Barry Soetero did go therehis name actually isn't listed among the notable alumni here. Perhaps an honorary degree is in order at some future point???

This week in Dallas, trade representatives are secretly negotiating new regulations for the Internet  including intellectual property provisions that could choke off online speech. The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) Agreement may be even worse than ACTA; it could tie the hands of democratically-elected legislators and create new, international standards for intellectual property enforcement. Worst of all, Internet users and free expression advocates like EFF aren't allowed in the room and are forbidden from seeing the negotiated text.

Click here to join EFF in demanding a Congressional hearing so lawmakers can learn what's in the TPP and hear from all affected stakeholders, not just deep-pocketed industry representatives.

U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk claims they have made "extraordinary efforts" to include public stakeholders in negotiations, but this couldn't be further from the truth. Like ACTA, negotiations have actively excluded civil society and the public, while welcoming private industry representatives with open arms.

EFF's International IP Director Gwen Hinze traveled to Dallas to demand transparency, but she wasn't allowed to see the draft text or be present for the negotiations. Here's how Gwen described the tactics the USTR is using to shut Internet users out from the negotiations:

Unlike previous negotiation rounds, there will be no official forum for stakeholders to present their views to the assembled TPP country negotiators. Instead, stakeholders are being asked to register their interest in sponsoring a table to provide negotiators who might so happen to stroll past with information on particular topics.

The public should be front and center in these negotiations, not relegated to a table outside.

Join EFF in calling on Congress for more transparency in TPP. Negotiators can't just shut out the public and their elected representatives.

I read your "Epiphany" column on TLE. Maybe you didn't mean to
misspell "Book of MormAn," but letting this typo get by when you
claim to have read the book several times undercuts your claim of
personal-experience authority, especially given that you are a
writer, who is expected to care about words. Many typos can be
forgiven and/or ignored, but one like this can create reasonable
doubt...